The Death of Jean Patou 1000

Hi PB.

There is a little something in the mail for you.

I find this letter trite and...odd. The "fine fragrance team" doesn't seem too customer service friendly, actually. I mean, how about a suggestion for a new Patou favorite rather than just letting the customer dangle?

Weird.

Somehow it is in the (stupid) minds of Big Corporations that we are all about coupons, promotions and freebies. And also the latest and the greatest. In their minds. That's why I am probably NOT a company's CEO.

Weeping with you about the discontinuation of Mille.

I just do not get P&G's attitude towards their Patou property.
I really believe they could turn this into the second coming of Chanel if they would just make the effort.
As of 2005 with the hiring of Duriez and the opening of the new Boutique in Paris it seemed like they were well on the way to doing that.
Here we sit less than four years later and Duriez is shipped off to try and "save" Rochas and they discontinue another classic Patou.
Somewhere in the minds of businesspeople this all makes sense but in the mind of this perfume lover this seems foolish beyond belief.

I doubt P&G really cares about their Patou account
I mean the sad thing is P&G makes their money off
of mass marketed celeb scents that every single girl
in juinor and senior high wears, Patou is more "spiecalty"
fragrance Joy is no wear near as popular as it once was but it's still
far more popular than 1000, I'm going to miss 1000

First of all, what a crumby website! It tells me nothing! And, What about the 1000 I saw for sale at Neimans? Is that being continued or what?
http://www.neimanmarcus.com/store/ca...00417cat000433

News like this is not only sad but quite anxiety provoking. Must we all rush out and scour the web for 1000? Will Joy join the scrapheap?

1000 is on my "to try" list. I never saw it in a store. Is there any chance to find it in stores other than Neiman Marcus? I don't think there is one where I live.

Ah yes, the brilliant minds that discontinued Patou pour Homme.

Another classic bites the dust...

This is so disconcerting. After reading all of the wonderful Jean Patou 1000 posts on last Saturday's SnS, I was all excited to give some a try...the scent sounded so great. While getting ready to leave work today, I logged onto BNs and found this thread. So, I went to Nordstroms after I left because I wanted to get a chance to smell the scent before it's no longer in stores. They had about 5 big bottles of 75 mL each (EDP). The tester was EDT. The SA didn't mention anything about the fate of the scent, but she was only baout 20 or so and seemed to only know about the "new" releases (I guess that's telling ). I must report that the EDT smelled lovely - albeit from a time gone by. At least that was my first impression from the small test I made. The beginning reminded me of Caleche, and then it seemed to go down another road. The sales woman made me a very generous sample vial, so I'll be testing it properly shortly.

Very sad.

Oddly coincidental: Ruggles sent me some 1000 shower gel that I just used yesterday. Even in a hot soapy shower, the scent really comes thru strongly.

If the French want to nationalize something, make it the fragrance industry. Get the corporate lunatics out. Banking is one thing but, for France wine, fragrance, art and fashion are what France is all about. Viva la France!

And don't forget the cheese! (maybe that's already nationalized, I don't know!!)

Viva la France!

Purplebird, I totally feel your pain, but my guess is that even if P & G continued to sell 1000, it would suck more and more every year.

(Sigh) My shopping cart at TPC grows more and more full...

1000 was my favorite and the best from Patou.

Well, one scent that is similar is Floris Edwardian Bouquet. I don't think it's as sharp with osmanthus, but it has the complex floral chypre. I stress similar.

I will try to think of some others.

I love "1000". I bought my bottle in a trip to Paris and this is the closest I could get near to the great perfumes of the past...

Some things should survive. Perfume is not only a product, it is art. Very - very sad...

I don't see any way we can fight this race for the new and cheap and easy to replace...

LOUSY NEWS!

I'm hopping mad.

Dang! Why must they be so stingy?? It's amazing and sad to realize that I've never once spoken with a SA who understood that the different versions of a scent are not necessarily just more, or less concentrated, but that one version can have different ratios of the same notes, as well as have different notes than the others.

I'm testing the EDT tonight.

Pomander my love I will explain it to you. The companies do not hire people who know the product well, nor do they hire people who even love it. Most hire the equivalent of a Fast-Food type worker who will sell the latest and the greatest. This is why I do not work in the industry any longer. I could tell my clients about any of the scents I sold, company history, idea behind said fragrance, notes, concentrations, why the French call body lotion body milk, etc...and at the end of the day no one cared.
The only company I felt appreciated by was Guerlain; I worked for them at Bloomies for 3 years. I was the go-to girl for any and all info, even by my account executive, having to do with things Guerlain. But sadly those days seem to have passed.
Once in a great while a SA will have knowledge about what they sell, more often then not they are just there to sell; newness, popular items, sure-fire gift ideas, etc...
This is what things have come to in the states, mediocrity is the norm and very few people know the difference. Even those who buy designer clothes; many are made in China, probably at the same factory as Walmart items, but they have the "Name".
P&G does not have a clue about fragrance, how could they...they sell household products. That is the equivalent of McDonald's purchasing Bill Blass and trying to design springwear. We are witnessing the death-knell of grand parfumerie, the taking over by niche companies (who sometimes are too creative I will nicely say) the selling out of the great companies, and the overall acceptance of things our parents, grandparents and great grandparents would not have accepted.
What happened to wanting the best, these days it seems to be wanting "Name-Brand" even if it is garbage. Marketing people know they can survive on brand loyalty alone, while continuing to cheapen product; Caron for instance.
Well I have droned on enough, about a subject that hurts me to the heart. Fragrance has always been the greatest passion of my life. I feel as if a life-long lover is dying in front of my eyes, yet I am unable to do anything.

Brielle, you said it perfectly. I'm crying with you!

I guess we must take solace in enjoying what's still around from the past, as well as in the modern-day "Greats" that could someday be classics to generations yet to come. At least until the mass perception of how perfumes should smell changes again. It seems widely accepted that certain types of scents become popular in certain times. And likely for very understandable reasons. We are not so far beyond the birth of JP1000 (1972). It’s not so difficult to imagine that after an era of mossy, powdery, sharp, and deeply feminine floral fragrances, the collective olfactory organ would grow tired of certain notes , and rebel with fresh, fruity, effervescent scents (the exact opposite). Is the demise of 1000 and others like it due to marketers who truly had the power to lead the masses in another scent direction? Did the “empowered”, career-tracked daughters of women who wore the 60s and 70s scents create a market for different perfumes to express their generation’s mark in this world? Did the fruity scents become so popular because in the high-stress, do-it-all lifestyle we modern women "won", lighter, less challenging scents invigorate the tired, stressed-out soul? And what of young women and teens? Are sugary, syrupy –woodsy Brittany scents simply comfort scents for little girls who missed out on cookies made by a stay-at-home Mom? Are we the ones holding the gun?

In the end, do you think that chypres are in general, an ilk that innately suits a smaller part of the masses? Perhaps only houses like Hermes and Estee Lauder want to, or can afford to keep fragrances in an esoteric scent-style (Caleche and Youth Dew) that don’t sell like “hotcakes’ from being retired.

Still, I sigh, and am with you Brielle et al, in sadness at the loss of a fine peice of art.

this is all very sad...

I walked by the Paris Jean Patou boutique a few days ago and there were signs on the door announcing reduced hours.
The boutique is absolutely beautiful; it's in the most exclusive area and quite large, by perfume store standards, and yet they had only 2 or 3 products for sale.
The store wasn't empty of product, but the same ones were repeated everywhere.

How did P&G end up with Patou? Yes, very sad, it seems like this house will be gutted under P&G ownership. P&G is all about mass marketing, they will have no clue or interest how to handle something high end like Patou.

I was in college in the early 70's, strongly independent and glad I was not coming of age in the same world that my mother did. I wore Chanel Cristalle the moment it came out in '74 at the ripe age of 19. -- PB, you ask an extremely interesting question and one I have mused upon, and been frustrated by, for several years... Your observations, as I am sure you know, extend far beyond our fragrances. The whole "art" of a being family came to a crashing halt (or developed "new rules" depending on you look at it) when we (women) asked for equality, went to work to earn our own money and have a career, and when we decided that single-motherhood could, in fact, be handled as long as we agreed that it was OK to have someone else raise our babies. The economy and the family, over time, changed significantly as we entered the work force and single-handedly created the 2-income household... with taxes to match which made the government very happy!

So... what? Be careful what you wish for? Who knows. But, I gotta tell you... up until PBs question here, I never thought that this whole argument would spill over to my fragrances... And now, frankly.. I'm a little pissed off!

Let's consider perfume as another art form for a moment. Compare it to paintings. Now in paintings many people feel that you can tell a lot about a society when you look at its art, it's a reflection of society and you have artists who do a good job at satisfying current demand and are very popular. Then there are artists who make that is not in fashion, that the majority of people do not appreciate as much. You can give people what they want to see, or you can show them something else because you think it matters.

In perfume I think you can continue this analogy and take it further. For many having pictures on the walls also has a function, it can brighten up a room very quickly and it just ..well you grew up with it maybe? You see it everywhere in houses and in magazines. Empty walls almost frighten people, the eye needs something to look at. Now you can think long and hard about what you want on your walls or you go to ikea and buy something random that will leave everyone indifferent and still gives you something on the walls. Or you get some cheap poster, again you have something on your wall.

Is it art? Probabloy not, is it interesting to follow ikea trends? Maybe over the long run in many many years people will be able to see and be able to tell something about our society and the fact that we even have an ikea.

For perfume I think the same applies, we have old masterpieces that are appreciated by art critics, who may appreciate it beyond the simple ' i need to have stuff on my wall' or ' i need to wear perfume' . We have ikea type scents that just gives everyone something to wear and like, that doesn't stand out too much but does the job at hand. We may have modern day artists that aren't appreciated yet or only by a few and we have brands that are above ikea quality, that are skilled at what they do and typical examples of decent or good perfume in this era.

Like art I think generations to come will draw their conclusions about why most people wear what they do and why it suited this era. I don't like it if we do this with a tone of looking down on perfumes and on people because they do not meet a standard of another generation.

Maybe they feel they no longer need leather scents and they can enjoy gourmande and girly scents because it is more accepted and they do not need to fight for equality? They don't have to feel ashamed of being feminine?

There can be so many reasons for explaining this taste of the era, but maybe everyone here is too closely linked to it judge it objectively? We don't have the distance to judge it fairly I think.

First they butcher 1000 beyond recognition, and then discontinue it? I didn't care much for the post-P&G 1000 anyways. It just isn't the same after you have experienced the real stuff.

Any sources for vintage Jean Patou 1000 please?

Long time lurker etc...
Found some parfum on fragrancenet.com... don't know if it is still there. LOVE this one, recent discoverer of Joy and Patou Forever (substitute Rasberry for jasmine in Joy, never liked fruity florals but this one too good to resist). Farewell Patou, thak Godess I had a chance to smell the real thing. Wore Sublime on my Wedding day...

Lian I like your art analogy and think it is appropriate here. I just would like there to be some way to still have these more challenging perfumes available. I also agree that I am way too close to be objective about it.
What is disappointing, to me, is that P&G went to all of the effort to begin to revitalize the Patou brand only to reverse course. I would like to know what caused the reversal in thinking in the P&G Fragrance division.

Purplebird, the women on this board are certainly in a better position to answer the sociological question you've posed. I would be disappointed to find that after all of the strides we've made as a society that women feel the need to follow the herd and can't envision themselves as individually as anyone else. As before this community is probably not the place for that answer as the women here are clearly one-of-a-kind and so far from the herd mentality as to be unable to spell herd.

If you can believe it, Joy has been discontinued as well, at least in North America. I have been scouring high and low here this week (Canada) trying to get a new bottle and the places that used to carry it (Bay & Holt Renfrew) both have said it's discontinued in North America.

When do they ever change something and improve it? It's always the other way around. They get you hooked on a good product, then pull the rug out from under you. It will catch up to them eventually.

I will go out on a limb here and try to sum up what has happened to the world of perfume.
When I worked in Sephora,amongst all my other places but we will use S. because of selection, women were not drawn towards the "classics". I would try day in and day out to show No 5, Shalimar, L'Air du temps, Joy, 1000, Miss Dior (for the moment we carried it) and many others. These women did not want any of it, they would always say "This smells like old lady." or "This smells like my mother/grandmother/aunt/great-grandmother." They all wanted new, hot, designer, celebrity, what everyone else was wearing. Once when someone used the "old lady perfume line" on me, I said "Oh, you would rather smell like a 12 year old playing in a bowl of ambrosia." They would just laugh and think I was joking with them, which I was not, but they wanted to be in leagues with their juniors.
Women in the states, I will make a sweeping generalization, have an obsession with youth and brand names. Not all of course, but a 90+% majority of all clients I have ever dealt with. So they veer towards fragrances a girl would wear, or the hottest designer bandwagon scent, or (even worse) a celebrity scent.
How can any of the classic "houses" go head to head with an unnatural obsession with youth. It is impossible, this is why they are allowing scents that have survived 2 world wars to fall off the charts, they would rather hawk some piss that is "trendy"
So in a nutshell; hooray for the woman's movement and equal rights, women have to try and act eternally cute and youthful. Which is sad, because I myself love the wisdom I have acquired with age, and acting like a lady as opposed to a school-girl.
This may not have hit any "nails on the head" exactly, but it is my take on things. So all of this, combined with EU restrictions on ingredients, makes one wonder about the future of scent.
I always wanted to smell like my elders, sophisticated and elegant, I do not see what is so "old" about that. We are bound to weep over many more casualties of our beloved fragrances as the years pass, this is one thing I have become accustomed to; not accepting of, but accustomed to.
How can one fight the onslaught of youth, especially when it is augmented by adults striving for "eternal" youth.
Until women start to feel comfortable in their own skin and accept aging as part of life, not something to be fought until the bitter end, we will see more scents "die" and be replaced by a fruity/juicy concoctions.

Well, Brielle, I know you are right but it is just so sad. I will never understand this comparison to "old lady/man perfume" with complex & interesting or out of the ordinary perfume. Or just plain beautiful. And don't people get tired of all the scents smelling alike? I really cannot tell one from another anymore. The good news is Jlo & Paris Hilton & Britney are all going to get old some day and I can't wait to see those perfumes get cancelled. That will be the day I break out the champagne & party like it's 1994!

I hate to say that they will never grow old, I really think they are femme-bots. They will just keep having comeback, after comeback, and flood the market with more scent. Mediocre scent to top it all off, why oh why cruel fate!
On a serious note though; I do not understand why everyone wants to smell the same, or why scents are pumped out quicker than new flavors of Hershey's kisses.
Just like you, I am praying for the day I can say "I saw the debut of (insert name of crappy scent) now I am witnessing its demise."
At least at the end of it all we have Estee Lauder, who I found out will keep producing a product if less than 2% of the overall sales of it are met. Go Youth-Dew!!!!!!!!! huzzah, huzzah!!

Ugh! Another thing about that ridiculous "old lady/grandmother" association: These "old ladies" and grandmothers, had very probably been wearing those beautiful perfumes since they were much younger ladies; they could have been long time signature fragrances. Only by the time the youths got around to being able to verbalize about the fragrance, were the ladies old enough for the youths to call them "old ladies," hence the association. Silly.

What's an extremely popular fragrance now? Angel. It's also regarded as a new classic by some. Will this be considered an "old lady" fragrance by future grandchildren?

For me describing something as an old lady scent means that you don't feel mature enough to pull it off. These perfumes are heavy, they are present and maybe more present than the woman in the shop herself is. For me that is what I mean with old Lady perfume, I do not have the presence to pull it off. It would wear me instead of me wearing it.

Again we are judging people rather negatively for using the ' old lady' description. And maybe they do not want to smell like their grandmother? Can we fault people for that? You can't change the associations people have with just a visit to a perfume shop.

I don't know, the connotation that was implicit in the comment to me, by clients, of "old lady scent" meant old grandma. Many people elaborated with "You know, this type of perfume, mothballs, and all that granma smell." I don't think they were worried about the heaviness of it, because the way they doused themselves with Pink Sugar I could have used an oxygen tank for myself.
But I think that is the difference, woman always made the scent their own, now many women want to find a scent that fits with them and their lifestyle.
I do understand this though; many of my friends were perplexed when I wore Shalimar and Arpège, not to mention Youth-Dew, at a very young age. But I was always an "old soul type". They were happy with Yves Rocher body spritzes.
The only sad part is, in my experience, that most women these days never feel they have reached the point when Shalimar, Youth-Dew, or No 5 become their signature scent, in turn many classics will stop selling. This means that more and more will go the way of 1000, My Sin, Scandale, and so many others.
As the saying goes; chacun Ã* son goût (each to their own taste), I fully support this, but it is becoming very homogenized and that is when the classics start passing.

I've been watching this thread with great interest...
Not much that I can add, because so many have expressed it very well- turning the prism, holding it up to the light.

One difference here:
Perfumes had personalities, and society allowed women to enjoy those personalities- without regard to 'old' or 'young'.
Yes, there was plenty of sexism. No doubt. I was there.

Now, women and men have to be careful NOT to OFFEND.
The non-scent, the skin scent, the easy scent.
The comfort scent.

Perhaps, we are not nearly so confident as we pretend-
And, with their Madison-Avenue-killer-instinct-
This has been detected and played....
Along with all of the PC-ness inherent.

And we have the IFRA responding in a reflexive fashion.

Only niche perfumers who don't attract too much scrutiny- will be able to'get away with' creating ballsy scents.
And only, for as long as they are able/ willing/ and appreciated.

I think that we need to be more vocal, as a group-
And continue with our protestation.

I have no difficulty with what is being produced- if it makes folk happy-
But it should NOT be to the exclusion of the art we risk losing.

Hip hip hooray!!! Hip hip hooray!!! for Chaya. You have put it perfectly and of course ever so eloquently.

One thing to consider which Chaya touched on is that so many ingredients are becoming restricted due to IFRA regs. Even fragrance launched just 5 years ago are having to be reformulated to ensure they make sure they do not contain banned materials.

Sometimes older fragrances cannot be reproduced accurately because of this. Add in also the fact that fragrances we all adore such as 1000 and Patou pour Homme shift may shift very few units even in France, and so the costs of reforfumlating fragrances (which can be as much as creating a new fragrance) can be prohibitive

It's all new, new, new these days. That's what the consumer wanted, so its what they've got

Hurray, Chaya and Grant! I wholeheartedly agree. The dearth of perfume as art (and the often prohibitively expensive niche perfumes that maintain the art) led me to DIY. I've spent several years and substantial bucks pursuing the weird, the (sometimes) beautiful, and the IFRA-banned scents that I love. I mostly wear my own things now...and that's sad, because I love discovering the work of others. Thank goodness for Luckyscent samples and bottle-splits!
This really is an art form, and profit-driven mega-corporations, in tandem with overprotective government bodies, will kill it if we don't keep it alive. Promote and protect the artisans, learn how to do-it-yourself, and write about good perfumes and your passion for them.

Take heart. I am convinced that the fruity/floral era too shall pass. One day a younger generation will realize that their elders have been wearing "candy and cupcakes" their entire lives. The "new" young generation will get this very "original" idea in their heads that they want to wear something that is actually SEXY. Not that the older fragrances smell "sexy" per se but they do not smell like something a little girl would wear. I let my 10 year old wear today's popular releases because they are almost indiscernible from scented lotion and body products. They (the "new" younger generation) will think themselves very bold to wear "spicy" fragrances. Of course I'll probably be 70 by then!

Thanks for resurrecting this excellent thread! Some very true words spoken! I can't see any possibility for a return to more natural and opulent, rich in the future. We have moved away so much everywhere (including perfumery). It is just not going to happen. I mean how 'funny' is that - I wear jeans and T-shirt with a sillage from classic Guerlains and get complimented by women, who in turn mostly smell like their cheap bathroom refreshers or sickly sweet fruit candies. I'd rather 'take a bite' from myself.

I am hoarding this 1000. I have a new bottle from Neimans I bought when this thread first ran and an open bottle I bought when I first discovered how good it was back in 2007 or so. (Shortly after joining BN)

I remember feeling really annoyed when I first tried it and was so thrilled by it - Where had this been all my life? I've been trying all this drek in department stores all these years and this great stuff has been here-unknown and unadvertised the whole time. Now as soon as I run across it-it gets discontinued.

This thread should have been called "the Slow, Agonizing, Torturous Death of Jean Patou." P&G Beaute International doesn't even own Patou anymore. They sold it to "Designer Parfums" about a year ago. "Designer Parfums" owns WORTH. We might look for Joy at the drugstore going forward, in "Holiday Specials" with matching body cream for $39.99, and it will be worse than the P&G Beaute Int'l version, which is hard to fathom. Stock up on your vintage bottles of all Patou scents, preferably pre-1999, when they were still made in France. P&G closed the Patou factory in Levallois shortly after acquiring Patou and contracted everything out in the U.K., that's why the later P&G versions are marked "Made in England." We, of course, are here discussing arguably the finest compositions of the XXe Century. Nobody rivaled the standard of Patou in it's time: Not Caron, not Guerlain. This is a fairly undisputed fact in the Industry. One note of caution: It is best to always buy vintage Patou *SEALED IN BOX.* Patou refused to use most of the chemical preservatives pioneered by Guerlain, and so any Patou product will degrade quickly once exposed to air and light. The ergon layer will still be intact in a sealed-in-box bottle, and it will never have been exposed to light. Once you open a bottle, use it! It will not likely last more than a year.

Chilling news. Thank you for this information, I was wondering who it was who bought Patou.

What baffles me about 1000 is that it is from 1972, somehow it feels like it is much older. Why did 1000 die so young?

Wouldn't it be great if someone thought it was worth while to keep producing it? I mean, they're getting over $200 a bottle here anyway.

It would be great. There are probably 1000 restricted ingredients in the formula I bet.

Jean Kerleo worked full time on the orchestration of 1000 for almost ten years. When the final comp was approved, it came to light that there was not enough natural Osmanthus being produced in China to guarantee fluency in fabrication, as 1000's primary innovation was the framing of this flower, a note previously unexplored in western perfumery, and never employed in this scale: This is why, from 1972 up until the mid 80's, each flacon of 1000 was hand registered and numbered. Patou was forced to purchase hectares of land in China, and to build a facility to distill the essence of this flower keeping up with the standard of quality that was its hallmark. The Osmanthus flower blooms and withers in one hour, once per year. The distillation process had to be conducted during this specific time slot, and, most importantly, enough "First Matter" had to be obtained. Creating 1000 was a daunting assignment. Patou had JOY, "The Perfume of the XXe Century" to contend with: 1000 had to live up to that singular legacy. Thus, a "parfum de fourrure" was created, as previously, there were none on the Patou menu. ("parfum de fourrure" = a perfume designed to scent fur. The house of Weil made a specialty of these, being a furrier) No expense was spared to create this landmark fragrance. As it panned out, not much money was ever made by Patou on sales of 1000. To the very end, (1999) only a certain quantity could be produced yearly, simply because the essences involved were so diverse, and so rare, and there were so many, that much toil and funds were required to obtain them. Here we have an example of what would never happen today: An house producing a fragrance that, from the get go, would not conceivably be profitable. Here we have one of the last examples of perfume as Art, not product. 1000 died so young because, as Cristobal Balenciaga memorably said upon announcing the shuttering of his house in 1968, "The World is No Longer Fit."